She was a Queen
by SweetDragonSeeker
Summary: For Peter it was a sword. For Ed, a duel. For Lucy, a lion. Lemme know if the rating should go up.
1. Treasure

**Random Susan long-ish drabble-ish thing. May write more with her later. She's channeling well. Don't own it.**

 **SSS**

"Have you done this before?" he asks, leaning close, and Susan blinks.

" _I...I have never done this before…" he murmured, his voice hesitant, and as soft as his touch. Susan smiled, reaching up to touch his cheek._

" _It's alright." she leaned her body against him, melting her lips against his…_

"Suse?" he presses.

" _Mmm…" Susan's fingers teased his hair, tangling in the long dark strands. His first movements against and within her are clumsy, and her hands slid down to cradle his hips in her palms. She gasped when he obeyed the touch, brushing just the right place…_

"Yes."

 _He was a fast study, and more disciplined than she'd expected. He didn't give in to his release until she found hers and then, even as he shuddered and his muscles tightened beneath her fingers, he held her gently and cradled her like something precious in his arms._

Abruptly uninterested in the current activities, Susan rolls from the bed, fingers reaching to refasten the buttons of her blouse.

"Suse?" her would-be paramour frowns, reaching for her.

"I have to go."

For Peter, it had been a sword. For Ed, a duel. For Lucy, a lion. But for Susan, it hadn't been so easy. Not until she'd lain in Caspian's arms, held like the treasure she had once been, had Susan felt like a queen again.

She reaches for her bag, slinging it over her shoulder and turning to the door.

"Suse? What's wrong?" He's rising from the bed now, eyes wide and hand reaching as though he could prevent her departure.

"I have to go."

"What?" He jumps from the bed, scrambling for his pants. "Why?"

She just shakes her head, and shuts the door behind her.


	2. Dress It Up

**Still not mine. Enjoy.**

 **SSS**

"It wasn't real." Susan told the mirror, and puckered her lips so that she could apply a layer of raspberry gloss. Behind her in the reflection, she could see her little sister's hopeful expression fall, her thin lips twist into a frown of disappointment and frustration.

Susan popped her lips, put down the gloss, and pushed aside a tube of concealing cream in favor of a soft brown eyeliner pencil.

"It was just a game we played, Lucy. Pretend."

Lucy stood then, brushing a stray lock of loose hair back as she headed for the door.

"I know you're lying."

The door closed behind her with a jarring snap.

Susan sighed, finished delicately outlining her left eye, and put the pencil down. Then she reached for the concealer and used her other hand to pull her hair back.

Carefully, she began smoothing the cream over the thin scar that traced a line from the corner of her eye nearly to her ear. It wasn't even worth the concealer, really. The mark itself was narrow and delicate, smooth, and only a shade or two paler that the skin around it.

But it was worth it to hide the memories.

 _The feel of her horse galloping beneath her, her siblings laughing as they chased their quarry. The great white beast pounding ahead but never getting nearer. The sharp edge of a branch whipping past, the sting as it sliced her skin lost in the euphoria of the chase._

Susan patted a thin layer of powder on to soften the concealer's edges, blend them into the rest of her skin, and began twining back her hair. The intricate braids and loops took enough concentration that old ghosts didn't stir again until she rose to slip out of her robe and into her new gown, a flowing confection of caramel and cream satin.

Then the scar on her hip stands out, a wide ribbon almost luminescently pale.

She's careful not to touch this one. She doesn't need to relive the battle that left that gash dripping scarlet down her thigh and her own heartbeat thrumming in her ears.

The satin is smooth as it slides over her skin, and she buttons the delicate pearl buttons that run up the side of the bodice with practiced ease. When she turns to the mirror again, she's every inch a lady.

She refuses to call herself a queen.

 **SSS**

 **R &R**


	3. Walk It Off

**Direct continuation of the last one. Not much to say.**

 **SSS**

The dance is in full swing when Susan and her parents enter the hall, and for a moment the sight of swirling dresses and the sound of boots on the polished floor make Susan draw back, something inside her flinching with indignation and hurt. There was once a time, a place, where no one took a turn around a dance floor until she had opened the ball herself. A time, a place…

She winces back from that thought too. She can't think about that. She's seen enough tears on her sister's cheeks, enough blood on her older brother's knuckles and shadows in her younger brother's eyes to know that trying to keep two people in one skin leads only to heartbreak.

Susan's mother puts her hand on her shoulder, urging her forward as though she thinks she's afraid, and Susan immediately steps out from under her hand and onto the shining floor. She's been looking forward to this night for weeks. Tonight, she will be Susan Pevensie, _just_ Susan Pevensie, and she will enjoy it.

And she does. She dances, and she makes small-talk, and she laughs lightly at things that aren't really funny, and she forgets that she was ever anyone other than who she is right now, at this very moment.

Until her fourth partner grabs her butt.

Susan Pevensie would have jerked away. She would have hissed a foul name at him and stalked off with dignity, because ladies don't make a scene.

Susan, the woman she is even though she'll never admit it, even to herself, knees him in the groin and stands watching him moan on the ground as around them the couples slowly grind to a halt to stare.

Keeping two people in one skin leads only to heartbreak, Susan thinks, watching him writhe with no remorse or apology, before turning and sweeping from the dance floor. The problem, she has come to realize, is exorcising the one you can't keep, without losing everything else in the process.

 **SSS**

 **R &R**


	4. Patch It Up

**My muse is being stubborn.**

 **SSS**

The bathroom light is on when Susan gets home. At first, her glance in its direction is automatic, but she pauses when she realizes that not only is the door open, but it's Edmund who is standing over the sink, bare back to the door.

Susan frowns. It isn't like Edmund to leave himself exposed like that; not when Susan is positive that their parents still don't know about the intricate tattoo that covers the nasty scar just below his right shoulder blade. In his last life, that scar was the result of a supposed friend stabbing him in the back; in this life, he got the scar when one of Peter's many adversaries pushed him over a stair rail and onto the iron fixture of the one below. Susan is fairly certain their parents don't know about that either. None of his siblings know where he got the tattoo, a lion's face comprised of various geometric shapes. They've never asked.

"Ed?" Susan turns down the hall, voice wary and concerned. Edmund tenses, then relaxes again, registering who spoke. He swivels slightly away from the sink, so that she could see the bloody cloth held against his abdomen. Her eyes widen and she speeds up, pulling his hand aside so that she can see the extent of the gash across his lower abs. She glances up at his face, concern mixed with exasperation.

"You have got to stop fighting." she growls, then turns to the medicine cabinet, searching for alcohol and bandages. She sick of this. Of Peter acting like coming back to England is so much worse for him than for any of the rest of them. Of Edmund stepping in to save him from his own egotistical idiocy. Of having to patch them up time and again, seeing the mirror images of old wounds on their skin and having to pretend she's never seen them before. To pretend she's doesn't know the exact extent of the injuries and exactly how long it will take them to heal. Exactly how the scars will look.

He sinks down onto the edge of the tub, still holding the cloth to his bloody flesh, and gives her a wry look.

"How's Pete?" she asks dourly, shoving aside his hand so that she can dab the wound with alcohol. He hisses, but his mouth curves up at the corner.

"Broke his nose."

She snorts, examines the wound critically, and begins the process of bandaging the gash. For a few moments, he is silent, watching her careful movements. He doesn't say that he is more than capable of cleaning and wrapping his own wounds. She knows. But this has been part of their relationship for longer than she'll admit to remembering. It's too ingrained for her to give up so easily, no matter how frustrated with him she is.

He begins to hum, soft and low. It's a Narnian melody, eerie and sweet, and for a few bares she fights to pretend it doesn't make her heart ache with want and regret and memory.

But this is Ed, and his eyes are closed, and his voice, finally reaching into his deeper adult range again makes her want to cry. So she sings. Her voice is hesitant, but she still knows all the words, and their voices still blend and beautifully as they ever did.

When the song is over, and his wound is clean and covered, they are silent for a moment. Then he asks, very softly.

"Do you miss it?"

It's her turn to close her eyes. She can't bring herself to look at him.

"I can't."

She can feel his eyes on her, and she tilts her head down. Her siblings are all so wrapped up in what they can no longer have that they can't understand why she's trying so hard to let go. They _can't_ have it anymore; what's the point in wishing?

She hears Edmund move, and waits for him to get up and leave. But then his hand cups the back of her head, and she feels the gentle press of his lips against her forehead.

A tear slips down her cheek.

This is one of King Edmund's gestures; one he used to end arguments with his royal sisters once upon a lifetime ago. It meant that he didn't necessarily agree with their decision, but that he understood. That he would let the battle go and support them however he could.

She hugs him hard when he pulls back, hiding her tears in his neck.

He holds her until she has no more tears.


End file.
